Abstract: A unified messaging system is configured to store and retrieve email, facsimile, pager, and voicemail messages. A telephone operated by a person is operatively coupled over a public switched telephone network to the unified messaging system. The system receives over the public switch telephone network a signal from the telephone corresponding to an administer multiple messages command for multiple messages having a common trait. In one form, the multiple messages having the common trait are then deleted from the database in response to this command. In another form, the multiple messages are filed into a folder specified by the person.

Abstract: A system for implementing a technique for operatively integrating an automatic call distributor and an interactive voice response unit is disclosed. Upon receiving and storing an interaction input from a caller seeking information, the automatic call distributor determines the availability of an agent workstation to respond to the interaction input. The interactive voice response unit provides the caller with access to the information when the automatic call distributor determines an agent workstation is unavailable to respond to the interaction input. The automatic call distributor transmits the interaction input to an appropriate agent workstation whenever that particular agent workstation becomes available to respond to the interaction input.

Abstract: A method, apparatus, and system places outbound calls using a predictive dialer at a call center and, optionally, receives inbound calls. The predictive dialing components use information about the substantive stage of the active calls at a given point in time to decide whether to begin to dial another outbound call. The calls that are considered may be inbound or outbound. In one form of the invention, statistics are maintained regarding each agent's passage through the various stages of an active call, then the statistics are used to control the predictive dialer.

Abstract: A novel customer interaction center server, and a novel method of operating a customer interaction center server, are disclosed. In one embodiment, a network of nodes (each representing one or more subsystem processes) and dependency relationships (indicating which processes depend on what other processes) is used to start the server, and the processes are monitored. In some of these embodiments, a failure of a particular process in the set of target processes is detected and logged and/or handled by implementing a selective shutdown and restart of only a subset of the processes represented in the network, based on the dependency information therein.

Abstract: A novel communication handling system 25 is disclosed. In one embodiment, communication handler process 120 accesses read-only, in-memory copies 130 of data tables from read-write table storage 140. In this embodiment, handler process 120 provides control information to hardware 101 so that hardware 101 performs selected actions, such as playing a recorded message, recording a message from the caller, transferring the call to a particular extension, etc. In other embodiments, communication handler process 120 directs voice, data, or video chat requests delivered via an external network 55. In still other embodiments, the in-memory copies 130 are updated manually and/or automatically. In further embodiments, handler process 120 may perform operations on sets of records from in-memory copies 130.

Abstract: A system for notifying and updating status of selected customer agent includes a customer computer, a computer network, and a customer contact processing computer. The customer contact processing computer is coupled to the customer computer by the computer network. The customer contact processing computer includes a storage unit to store a status indication for each agent. The customer contact processing computer is responsive to an input from the customer computer over the computer network, which corresponds to a selection of at least one of the agents by a customer computer. The customer contact processing computer transmits over the computer network the status indication for the selected agents from the storage unit to the customer computer. The customer contact processing computer updates the status indication transmitted to the customer computer for the agents from time to time.

Abstract: A novel communication distribution system is provided. In one form, an automatic communication distributor manages multiple queues of calls waiting to be handled by agents. When a call is transferred to an agent's workstation, the workstation provides different ringing signals to the agent based on the automatic communication distributor queue from which the call is coming. In another form, a computer-readable medium is encoded with programming instructions that are executable by a processor to differentiate between calls coming from different ACD queues, and to provide different ringing signals to a user based on that differentiation.

Abstract: A system for implementing a telecommunication number processing technique is disclosed. The deployed system, e.g. a call center, comprises a CT server and a telecommunication switch. The deployed system can further comprise a computer network. The CT server receives a telecommunication number input from a telecommunication switch or the computer network. The telecommunication number input represents a telecommunication number to dial a telecommunication call to a telecommunication subscriber located within the system, or an external telephone. In response to the telecommunication number input, the CT server provides a standardized number corresponding to the telecommunication number input. The CT server subsequently provides a dial plan corresponding to the standardized number. The dial plan includes a dial string, a dial group, and a dialing classification.

Abstract: A system of networked computers is disclosed having a number of servers and a number of clients. The clients are each provided with a server selector routine and the servers are each provided with a server reporter routine. The server selector routine of any of the clients is operable to obtain server processing load information from the server reporter routine of any of the servers. The server selector routine is responsive to a client activation request for a software task designated for server execution to select two or more servers to interrogate for server processing load information and designate one of the servers to execute the software task based on the server processing load information obtained by this interrogation.